Indians in my opinion Indians are one of the worst. They are nice to you until the know you status. Once they find out your below them they will treat you like dirt. This was told to me by a friend of mine who was Indian.
Another time I was doing a ward round in hospital with an Indian doctor ( who was trying to scab his way into Aus) and he turned to me and said a few words about a poor person who was sick in bed. The words were to the affect of " don't worry about her, you can't turn a donkey into a racehorse"
I also now work in a few clinics with 3 Indian drs. They lie and cheat on their medicare claims ( they write down false item numbers to claim from medicare )and they have no morals including stealing patients from other drs ( the other drs have complained to me about this). The receptionists know they do this but are to scared to say anything.
India is full of crime and corruption. We don't need that here.

Pericles asks whether I think the Indian caste system is a "good thing" or a "bad thing."

For what its worth I think it's a "bad thing."

However that does not mean it won't continue.

Both you and Col Rouge are missing my point.

I am not commenting on whether the continued existence of distinct groups is a "good thing" or a "bad thing."

I am simply giving reasons why I think distinct groups MAY continue to exist in Australia and why blue-eyed people MAY not be facing extinction.

Sexual selection is always the wild card.

Another group that appears to have maintained its identity is the Gypsies of Europe.

The Exclusive Brethren are probably a transitory phenomenon but who knows?

Pericles and Col Rouge think that merely living in close proximity will over time eliminate distinct ethnic/cultural identities.

Chuck everybody together, and sooner or later they'll all just blend into one, right?

I can think of at least three obvious examples that defy this conclusion: The Caucasus, New Guinea and Switzerland.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peoples_of_the_Caucasus

There are *41* ethnic groups living in the Caucasus.
An area of land half the size of New South Wales!

These groups have lived in close proximity to each other for centuries, but have still maintained distinct ethnic identities.

Why haven't they all just blended together?

New Guinea is an *island* about the same size as New South Wales.
It's been inhabited for at least 40,000 thousand years.
There are about *1000* tribal groups, almost all with their own exclusive language.

Why haven't they all just blended together?

Switzerland is smaller than Tasmania, and has existed for centuries.
Yet it has 26 regional governments.

Despite living within one national border for hundreds of years, the four cultural groups of Switzerland remain largely confined to separate regions (and not through any oppressive segregationist policy either).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Map_Languages_CH.png

Why haven't they all just blended together?

The Caucasus, New Guinea and Switzerland show us that ethnic identities can persist for centuries, despite multiple ethnic groups living in close proximity, within a small region.

Why would it be any different in Australia?

Shockadelic “Why would it be any different in Australia”

If Australia had been colonised by the Swiss or New Guineans or (geographic) Caucasians it would be the same as them.

Much to its benefit, Australia was fortunately colonised by the British.

With the dominant racial group still in Australia being British, (Irish, English, Scottish or Welsh). One of the major characteristics is an uncanny capacity to interbreed (maybe the desperation whipped up by "any port in a lusty storm").

With some groups the resistance to interbreeding was enforced by religious beliefs (eg Judaism, although despite being an English protestant, I do have 2 great grandmothers who were apparently born into the twelve tribes (of Israel), again demonstrating the British capacity for interbreeding.

I would note, the Jews of England were recognized by other Jews for the way they were “accepted” by Britain in a manner not so common in eastern Europe (Queen Victoria was not known for conducting pogroms, in the manner of her nephew, the Russian Czar)

“Caucasians” were possibly following some observance to fend off assimilation from the incessant flow of invading armies too and fro between Asia and Europe.

It really does not matter.

Like it or not, the “dominant” immigrant culture of Australia is going to remain British (for the next many generations at least). The resistance to assimilation will progressively break down as the common Australian language (English) destroys any lingering bastions of isolationism and the “melting pot” will absorb all, even those seeking to defend and perpetuate Caucasian, Swiss and New Guinean inbreeding.

Strange, Shocka could have commented on the state of Belgium, the Flemish versus the Walloons or the German speaking minority.

Europe is littered with quaint ethnic groups who are disappearing as communication, both physical and electronic focus on the major language groups, eroding the separate religious, linguistic, monetary and legal systems which have kept them apart for generations. Sooner or later, most of Europe including the Swiss will be speaking Esperanto

So that is why it will be different in Australia, just another part of Australia’s Great British Inheritance and Heritage.

Esperanto! Are you kidding?

Esperanto's been around since 1887, yet isn't the official language of any nation, and is spoken by less than 1% of Europeans.

Take a look at the real Europe as see how impossible this "One Europe" would be:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Languages_of_Europe_no_legend.png

These cultural groups have been aware of each other for centuries and are related, but different ethnicities persist.

It is ridiculous to believe all these people are somehow going to all start speaking only one language and sharing a common culture.
That's just an unrealistic fairytale.

They may all learn English (not Esperanto) as a second language, but they'll still maintain their own too.
And their cultures may influence each other, but they'll never become just *one* culture.

Far from all blending together, the world seems to be becoming even more determined to maintain separate ethnic communities.

Look at the Basque, Tamil, Sikhs, Kurds, Quebec, Chechnya, Tibet.
Are these "quaint" ethnicities passively and quietly dying out, to make way for the Brave New World Order?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_active_autonomist_and_secessionist_movements

The Soviet Union, which *tried* to unify diverse peoples, ended up splitting into Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Estonia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine and Uzbekistan.

Note how each of these new nations is defined by *ethnicity*!
There are still active secessionist movements within Russia.

"Strange, Shocka could have commented on the state of Belgium, the Flemish versus the Walloons or the German speaking minority."

Well, Col Rouge, if "Europe is littered with quaint ethnic groups who are disappearing", why are members of all the ethnic groups in Belgium either seeking independence or propose splitting up the nation and joining neighbouring countries?

There is no "one world", there are many worlds and always will be many.

"Australia" should be one of those many worlds, with its own distinctive character (which is British-based, but not quite "British").

Can we really maintain our distinctiveness with migrants coming from all over the world, a large number from completely unrelated cultures?

The hilariously irony of people like Col Rouge is that cultural imperialism is a bad thing only if it's the Vatican or the Nazis or *somebody else*.

But when it's your own preferred brand of society, then advocating universal conformity is a wonderful thing!

You can be an arrogant white imperialist if, and only if, you advocate secular humanist materialism.

Nobody should have a problem with that social model.
If they do, they're stupid, wrong, false, evil.

Col Rouge is no different to the people he claims to despise.
He wants everyone to be just like him.
A secular, humanist materialist.
And for society to be based on this, and only this, model of existence.

Isn't this just perpetuating the "us and them" concept with different terms?

Under secular humanist materialism people will be free-floating self-actualisers, "liberated" from the nasty historical entanglements of God, nation, and quaint, silly ethnic customs.

They will be morally good, without religion.
They will think only in terms of the planet as a whole, not bits and pieces carved up on a map, despite nobody actually being capable of living everywhere simultaneously.
(Isn't "planetism" just nationalism with a bigger border?)

And of course in this Utopia of free-floating secular humanist materialists, there won't be any of those nasty, silly conflicts.

Except that there are secular humanist materialists who want a *capitalist* economy and secular humanist materialists who want a *socialist* economy.

Uh-oh!

"Time, believers, to fight for what's right and good and true!
The capitalist/socialist (delete one) way!
Come, brothers and sisters. Onward to Glory! Freedom! Justice! Truth!
Some of us may die in battle today, but our war, unlike all those other stupid ones, will be worth it.
We must free mankind from the evil, false belief of capitalism/socialism (delete one), once and for all!
Charge!"